


Except that you see someone in the next room

by themunak



Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis, xxxHoLic
Genre: Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-27
Updated: 2014-09-27
Packaged: 2018-02-18 23:44:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2366372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themunak/pseuds/themunak
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kaoru realizes that it's <i>not normal</i> for transparent black clouds to be hovering around someone like that, and for that particular someone to yell loudly and flail like a weirdo like his life depended on it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Except that you see someone in the next room

**Author's Note:**

> Self-beta'd? Yes. Written at stupid o'clock in the morning? Yes. Made half drunk, not sleepy and too much energy to spare? Absolutely yes. Imagine my surprise to see this file sitting in my desktop and not remembering much about how it came about.
> 
> Title from Adayume by Suga Shikao. I think it's pretty fitting, since he does a lot of xxxHOLiC songs, and this is one of them.

He jogs the same route every day. Inui-senpai never actually told him which particular route to take, as long as he gets it done. Kaoru himself is the one to map out his route, and like the fastidious young man he is, he sticks to it religiously.

He tends to jog through the suburbs from his house all the way to where the houses taper off to reveal some still-empty lots, and the beginnings of the apartment buildings, one of which he's sure Inui lives in. Then he starts jogging towards the more commercial districts with their shops and office buildings, and then bridge he usually trains underneath, before taking a path back towards his house. It's familiar, it's routine.

However, today, his routine is interrupted not by fluffy cats owned by teammates, or upperclassmen blowing up his cellphone and talking about dates, but by screaming. High-pitched but not a girl's voice, long like the person has some really good lungs on him, and getting louder by the second. And that? That is unusual enough to make Kaoru stop and look around for the source of the noise, because that honestly doesn't sound like someone's watching a ( _shudder_ ) horror movie with the volume turned up high.

(But it's likely, since he's near the suburbs now and he's heard... _things_ before.)

Kaoru can see some guy running towards his direction, before stopping several feet away. The scream abruptly cuts off too, replaced by the loud panting of someone whose stamina has run out, so it's easy to put this guy and the scream together.

Not that it's too difficult to do, since he does look like the screaming type. Tall, about as tall as Kaoru, but skinny like he doesn't eat much (or train at all, since he's doubled over and panting), and with limbs from here to there. A teenager, maybe his age-- he has no idea, really, since he's not Inui-senpai who can calculate that kind of thing. Weird eyes too, one yellow-gold and one blue. Kaoru's pretty sure that there's a term for it, some kind of scientific explanation that has to do with genetics, but he doesn't know about either. He might ask Inui-senpai later.

'Wimp' is the strongest thought that crosses Kaoru's mind. Something in the guy's body language just _screams_ it. But his school uniform (not Seigaku but it's a gakuran too, just with white at the collar and cuffs instead of being a solid black all around) is clean and well-ironed, even if he's been running and it's already late in the afternoon, and Kaoru can appreciate some kind of cleanliness, cant he? Especially when other guys his age are slobs.

But apparently this one has a bad habit of talking to himself, like that guy from Fudomine, except this one isn't mumbling.

"Oh god, for as long as I live, I am _never_ doing that again. It's just like _her_ to shove me into dangerous situations and then leave me to get out of them on my own! I cant catch a break like this, and I haven't even gotten everything I needed done yet. I'm definitely late, and I bet _she_ is going to take it out of my tab again..."

How someone still has breath to rant like that is impressive, even if Kaoru's not the kind of guy to admire a whiner. It's probably because it's a novelty.

Now he's watching the other kid straighten up suddenly like he's been electrocuted in the back and wave his fists at thin air.

No, wait, not quite thin air. Now that Kaoru's actually paying attention, he can see something. Small clouds of smoke, a little like what had happened to their last stove the previous summer when Mother was trying to get the old thing working again but couldn't and roped Kaoru into helping her buy a new one. Except these clouds were faint, transparent-- he could see right through them. And they were definitely hovering around the boy in a very un-smokelike way, which was why he was waving his arms around.

Then Kaoru realizes that it's _not normal_ for transparent black clouds to be hovering around someone like that, and for that particular someone to yell loudly and flail like a weirdo like his life depended on it.

Oh, _god_.

"Oh god!" Apparently the guy's been thinking the same thing. "Not again, no no no, ugh! Get away you bastards-- aaaaahhh! DAMNED SPIRITS!"

With that yell, the guy sets off at a run again-- and for that matter, so does Kaoru, but at a much faster pace than he'd begun his daily routine with. There are freaking _ghosts_ in this neighborhood, and he's getting out of here as fast as he can. Getting the hell out and not looking back. Maybe retreat to the louder districts so the spirits wont try and keep up with him if they decided that he's a much better target than the one who's as skinny as a noodle.

Out of the corner of his eye, he catches the other boy making a sharp turn-- right into an empty lot, and _how is THAT going to help?_ Kaoru wonders.

Until the boy vanishes the moment he steps through the old, rotting fence posts, and Kaoru decides that he's _done_ with this part of the neighborhood.

He's never jogging in or near this place ever again.


End file.
